Dual Core or Quad Core?

[Tom Buskey]

On 6/29/07, warlord at mit.edu <warlord at mit.edu> wrote:
>
> Quoting Jerry Feldman <gaf at blu.org>:
>
> > Most of the previous posts have pretty well answered most everything.
> > As Maddog points out, Linux scales well up to 8 CPUs, but much work is
> > being done with 32, 64, and 128 by IBM, HP, and SGI.  In your case,
> > it's not so much that you are going to stress the CPUs, it is more the
> > I/O of loading the applications. Fortunately, Linux and Unix
> > applications do a good job of mapping files to memory. So, as others
> > have stated, quad core is definitely a win in your case.  The other
> > thing to look closely at is the cache sizes. The 1.6Ghz vs. 2.0 Ghz is
> > minuscule, but make sure you don't get less cache.


Sometimes less cache is better then more.  I remember reading an article
(Byte?  SunExpert?) that evaluated cache size for various algorithms on
various CPUs (sparc, alpha, ?).  There was definitely a sweet spot.  I
remember the cache sizes making at 128k or so.


I wonder, has anyone profiled VMware (in particular the free VMware-server)
> to see how it would perform on an Intel vs AMD quad-core?  If I want to
> run a half-dozen VMs simultaneously am I going to get better performance
> out of an Intel or AMD?  I SUSPECT AMD (due to the aforementioned memory
> bus differences) but I have no real numbers to back up my
> estimates.  Anyone
> else done that kind of profiling?


VMs are definitely I/O contrained.  They recommend that high I/O
applications not be run on VMware.

Back when overclocking was in vogue (still?) increasing the system bus
gained more then the CPU speed.


-derek
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